


I Still Believe In Summer Days

by Katherine



Category: The Aristocats (1970)
Genre: Gen, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-11
Updated: 2018-11-11
Packaged: 2019-08-21 21:11:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16584272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katherine/pseuds/Katherine
Summary: She was permitted the liberty by Madame of jumping up on the desk, as Duchess had considerable stake in the information spread out there.





	I Still Believe In Summer Days

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Merfilly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/gifts).



> For Merfilly, whose Aristocats request mentioned "maybe a story of just Duchess and Madame? Show me their time together? Or choosing the father of the kittens."
> 
> Title from Ingrid Michaelson's "Winter Song".

She was permitted the liberty by Madame of jumping up on the desk, as Duchess had considerable stake in the information spread out there. Duchess set each paw carefully on the papers, her tail waving as she found herself remembering her own not so distant kittenhood.

More than once, still growing into grace, she had fumbled a leap on to the desk and scrabbled at the edge with her front paws. Surely the furniture had all been taller then. The papers had drifted down, an entertaining interior snowstorm that Duchess had set herself to chasing after and pouncing on.

She was much more dignified now, and settled herself flat, touching her nose delicately to the nearest page. It had the dry scent of paper, ever so faintly reminding one of crisp linen. Also the tang of fresh ink.

It is no light thing, to choose a father.

"This one is a champion. White all over as you are, my dear," Madame said quietly, as she looked over yet another page. "But perhaps we would like some variety in looks?"

She stroked lightly along Duchess's back, and Duchess started a soft, rewarding purr.

Madame's questions were rhetorical, but the illusion that Duchess could provide answers and have them respected was a good one. Madame would pay attention to possibilities, and would choose well. Or, if none at all of these prospects suited in the end, Madame could postpone the matter with a plan try again next season.

With these reassuring thoughts, Duchess stretched herself luxuriantly under Madame's slow-stroking hand. While Madame kept tickling between her pricked ears then again down her back Duchess flexed her paws, gently kneading at the velvet upholstery.

*

Winter sliding into spring was a good time of year to decide about making kittens.

Duchess leapt up to the windowsill, centering herself between the softness of the draped curtains and the cool smoothness of the window's glass. Watching the scattered snowflakes drifting down she let her jaw work, chattering. The little, irregular motions of the snow invited ideas of chasing.

When Madame called her, she turned away from the view of outside and padded deeper into the warmth of the house.

With a sire yet unchosen, it was early to be doing anything of this - to be changing her home for kittens yet unmade - but Madame seemed to revel in it, and Duchess appreciated it too.

She was to have a special inner corner, well-appointed with blankets, in which to birth and first look after her litter. There was to be an entire room made over for them, to be a nursery. The music room, with the piano.

Duchess herself would still have the run of her home. She perched on the couch arm, considering the spread of wallpaper samples laid out over the seat. The floor was a good, light wood. Floral wallpaper, perhaps (Madame had several patterns among the samples), and good thick curtains. Those could be green, to pick up the look of leaves.

In a fit of silliness unsuited to the good example she would soon need to be as a mother (except that no cat is ever the best example at every time) she leapt clear from one side of the piece of furniture to the other, tightrope-crept along the back of it for another round, before settling atop Madame's slippers.

Madame dangled a length of ribbon. "You can jump for it. You're not a matron yet, my dear."

Duchess bunched her hind legs, and extended herself upwards to play. Further decorating questions could be decided another time.

The tall vases of flowers would be put away once there were kittens stumbling about. Or would they stumble? Perhaps Duchess could teach them so well, and her children learn so readily, that they would be graceful from the first.

That night, Restless, Duchess circled through the house, room after room, twined herself around the oak legs of a table, then paused by the richly upholstered couch. She stretched herself tall, not scratching (she was too certain of appropriate behaviour for that) but at least using her shoulder muscles.

She could, of course, take herself out through the low kitty door whenever she wished. Explore again the garden and grounds, or further into the city. But if Madame woke and noticed her absence, she would worry.

Duchess didn't disturb her in the opposite way by entering her bedroom (although she could have been whisper-quiet), but took herself to Madame's dressing room.

She put her front paws up on the elaborate frame of Madame's mirror and leaned to touch nose to matching pink nose with her own reflection. It was strange enough to imagine kittens of her own, let alone the cats they would someday grow to be.

She went to the red upholstered chair and footstool, lightly touching the gold tassels underneath to make them swing back and forth. She had crept beneath them when she was younger and smaller. Her own children might do so, play games of hide and seek.

*

Madame was having an afternoon lie-down. Duchess curled up on a footstool, one paw dangling comfortably, her tail wrapped close and tickling at her nose. She felt a little, unaccountably, melancholy. The arrangements would be well made, the room decorated, her future kittens looked after and offered the best of opportunities. Yet all of that would form a new phase of life.

She nearly wanted to go to the door Madame's room, to lift her voice in a yowling song as she had not done since she was a kitten herself. Or, quieter from herself but with the thud of fast paws, race up and down the front stairs. Then go skidding across the cool tiles in the entrance area beneath.

All the active, undignified ways of playing that her future kittens could discover.

*

Duchess's time came upon her that very nightfall, sooner than Madame had calculated it likely to. In guilt and excitement, Duchess perched next to Madame's luxurious bed, watching her sleep. Duchess could curl up to sleep herself, present her state upon the morrow, leave it to Madame to make a lasting choice and hurry the timeline of introductions.

Instead, Duchess slipped out into the night.

She returned before dawn, feeling satisfied yet just a little wary.

Her children would be pampered, as Duchess herself frankly was. And they would carry forward as well an ancestry of strong survivors.

*

Madame hovered over the warmly appointed corner. Duchess watched with squinting approval as Madame leaned nearer but did not presume to touch the three newborn kittens. They were snug against Duchess's side, warm and active. So small, but each one perfect.

They were damp from the birthing and from their first bath under Duchess's tongue. Folded ears and tight-closed eyes. Already strong. One white, one a ginger-red, and her third dark as an evening suit.

There was a comfortable whisper of a laugh in Madame's voice. "What wonderful variety there is in your children."


End file.
